The Space Bears Neptune’s Pride 2 diary – Days 1 to 3 – A humble beginning

A close friend of mine became rather addicted to Neptune’s Pride 2: Triton in the early months of this year, after I introduced it to him. Part of his addiction has led to the playing of many games, far more than I’ve ever played, and in his time he even managed to secure a place in the group stages of the Neptune’s Pride 2 World Championship back in July (3 games of 6 people). Due to the importance of the game to himself and to the community of Neptune’s Pride, I persuaded Sam to keep a log of the major events (similar to that done by both us and Rock, Paper Shotgun) and he went a step further to keep a detailed and entertaining diary. I will post the diary in short segments for you reading pleasure!

Beginnings

Six great powers have arisen in this galaxy – our own beloved space bears, and five races of half-civilised monsters.

We are uncertain as yet what our policy should be toward these deeply inferior beings, but we must set a few policies regarding our immediate neighbours it seems. We would do well not to expand too far and too fast and anger the surrounding peoples, but fortunately there are convenient gulfs on either side of us. As for the centre ground – the cluster of five stars nearest us will suffice. It would not do to become the largest power immediately and have the righteous fury of the others bear down on us (no pun intended… well maybe a little).

Our first moves will be…

1. To grab the star of Sirius before the hideous Yellow Slug people to the East can do so (our finest bear scientists estimate that we can be there in 17 hours against Yellow’s 18).

2. Move a sizeable fleet of fighter bears into the centre to claim our five stars.

3. Send a single fleet (the cost is great at this early stage) to take the remaining available stars close to the home world of Old Big Bear.

Finally, we will invest in just one science point and two industry points at present – economy is everything at this early stage, and that can be bought at the end of the cycle. We shall also focus research on weapons, so that our space tanks might be all the more devastating.

 

 

Day 1

As the first production looms, this is the state of affairs:

The star of Sirius was successfully taken before the Yellow Snail things could take it (they made no attempt, wisely, as our ferocious space bear tanklords would have squashed them). In addition, the squadron of 30 space bears have taken their first star in the centre zone.

Diplomatically, we have made two contacts thus far…

1. The Red Kfixi people to our South. We contacted these folk to establish a non-aggression pact, as we already have a gulf between us, and we must say, we found them to be very agreeable and pleasant to deal with. Barbarians they may be, but they show a glimmer of good space bear mannerisms, and we are keen to maintain good relations. They agreed to our NAP, and we have also agreed to trade weapons tech for their experimentation technology as soon as our respective scientists have made their breakthroughs.

2. The Green people, ruled by Lord Boru. We were keen to make contact with these folk, as the Yellow empire of the Yellow Slug beasts lies between us, with access to many stars and the capacity to grow very strong indeed. Lord Boru shared my concerns about Yellow, whom we agreed to monitor, and we agreed to trade weapons tech for terraforming.

 

 

Day 2

Our noble friends from the Red stars made contact early on, so that we might mark out our own desired stars in the centre and avoid conflicts. We would take the four stars seen in Orange below, and further East, I would take the star now called Val Ursii while he would take the star of Muphrid, as ‘outposts.’ This makes the Ursine Empire rather extended, but it was well worth it – it is a very wealthy star, ideal for commanding the centre of the galaxy. Providing of course, that it can be industrialised enough…

We have also had contact from the mighty savages from the South – the Blue empire, commanded by Lord Kirk. He asked if there was anything we might work together on, and the supreme council of the Space Bears agreed that this was an attempt to draw us toward an anti-Red alliance. Sure enough, when we responded with offers of trade and requests of further information, Lord Kirk suggested a two pronged attack on the noble Red stars, and asked that at the very least we do not ‘arm’ the Red Kfixi people. After much deliberation (we also noted that stars have begun to change hands at the Red-Blue border), it was decided that we would share these developments with Lord Kfix, of the Red stars. We await his reply.

Little else of note occurred today. We had more contact with the Green people, each of us probing the other for news from the rest of the galaxy. We should make it our policy to form a closer bond with these people – since war with Red is out of the question, and since attacking across the centre would be suicide, then Yellow can be our only target, and this means that we will surely need Green warriors to fight alongside our brave space bears on a second front.

Finally, the first tech levels started appearing today – both Blue and Cyan gained new technology, and seem to have traded with each other, giving them both weapons 2 and manufacturing 2. This Southern alliance strikes us as extremely dangerous, but there is little we can do at present. A space bear can only do so much.

This is the galaxy after two days:

 

Day Three

Lord Kfix thanked us for the intel regarding Kirk’s intentions, and we agreed I would entice the Blues to attack under the impression I was helping, and be repulsed by Kfix’s entire Red army. He also made tentative queries about the state of our relations with the Green stars. It seems he has a trade agreement with them, and when I replied that I did too, we agreed that these people seem like worthy folk. This could be the beginnings of a possible triple alliance, but then again maybe not. If it were, it would certainly be helpful on the tech front. But in the long term, if the monstrous Slugs between Lord Boru and I were eradicated, it would leave the Reds and greens free to devour Blue and Cyan, and we noble space bears would find it hard to take part in their conquest.

But that is a long way away yet. At present, the binding together of my two allies would be a very beneficial thing indeed.

Diplomacy also continued with Lord Kirk the Blue. He pressed for a date at which we might attack Red, and I hesitantly suggested 24 hours time. The council was unsure as to whether this would allow Lord Kfix enough time, but he assured us it would be fine later on. This dupe must pay off – if I betray Kirk and he still takes the Red stars then I’ll have a pissed off and powerful Blue power on one border, and a race of slugs whom I will probably have attacked on the other border. We must place our trust in Kfix and his red army.

Speaking of the Yellow snail things, a fleet has been touring the central stars, picking up ships along the way, and now a force of 143 fighter bears has been assembled. Yellow has only 198 ships in his entire domain, so this would be a prime time to strike. Just need to get Lord Boru the Green on board.

This is the galaxy at the end of the third day:

No big changes star-wise really. Economically, the space bears have pulled ahead, we are the only race with banking 2 technology, and even without it we have the greatest economical infrastructure, followed closely by the Kfixi, our allies. Just as pleasingly, we also have the highest industry too, and the greatest number of ships. This bodes well.